


Just Like Marty McFly

by thedevilchicken



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Co-Parenting, Kid Fic, M/M, Parent-Child Relationship, Parenthood, Post Mpreg, Time Shenanigans, Time travel-related amnesia, Timeline Shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-09
Updated: 2019-09-09
Packaged: 2020-10-13 15:29:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20584787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken
Summary: Right now, there are two things Scott knows with complete certainty:1) When he went to sleep thirteen nights ago, he had one kid and absolutely no husbands2) It turns out sometimes time travel really does work likeBack to the Future





	Just Like Marty McFly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TiaNaut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TiaNaut/gifts).

Right now, there are two things Scott knows with complete certainty: 

1) When he went to sleep thirteen nights ago, he had one kid and absolutely no husbands. Definitely not two kids. Definitely not one husband. No extra kids or husbands that he knew about, at least, 'cause some really weird crap had been happening lately - mostly since he'd put on a superpowered suit like the fricking Iron Man of the insect world.

2) It turns out sometimes time travel really does work like _Back to the Future_. Kinda. And maybe some of the other Avengers could even tell him why that is, but he's not about to ask. He's fallen into that trap way too often and wound up trying to inch out of the room with a nod and a smile while Professor Hulk talks physics with him. To him. Okay, basically _at_ him. 

(The third unnamed truth here is that Scott is never going to be a world-class physicist. Honestly, he's fine with that.)

Thirteen nights ago, Scott had one kid and no husbands and you totally couldn't travel back in time to change your own future. 

When he woke up twelve days ago, after thirteen nights ago, things as he'd known them had apparently changed. 

\---

Scott woke in a bed he didn't remember with an arm slung over his chest that he was pretty darn sure he hadn't left there the night before. 

He'd like to think his woke-up-in-the-wrong-bed what-the-frick-did-I-do-last-night teenage drinking years are way the hell away behind him, sometime in the late eighties, and it didn't feel like he was nursing a hangover at all, let alone a bad one. It was dark, though, with a seam of light around the edge of what he guessed was a set of blackout blinds, so who knew what was happening - the only way he knew he didn't know the room was that it smelled kinda different, not like the mid-range aftershave Cassie gave him for his birthday and that he'd spilled all over his rug. He'd been trying to tell people he just liked the smell but he was pretty sure they all knew he was a (sometimes literally) gigantic klutz. 

He moved. The idea was he'd quietly slip out of bed from under the mystery arm and get to the blinds and find out where the hell he was, even if he wasn't sure if the ground was going to turn out covered in mantraps or superglue or maybe just a bunch of stray Legos lying in wait. But when he moved, the arm over his chest moved with him; he wound up stretched out trapped on his side with someone's chest pressed up against his back and someone's arm around his waist and their face nuzzled into the back of his hair. It was a broad chest. It was a big hand. And when their owner muttered something, sleepily, lowly, making him shiver, Scott made a face that might've been something like frowning. 

"Um, Cap?" he said. He shot for casual but he guessed being spooned by Captain America really wasn't a casual thing. At least not for him. Maybe there were guys out there for whom that really was casual, and normal, and totally not weird at all like they'd just skipped into Bizarro World, but that was not true for Scott Lang.

Cap grumbled against his neck. He tightened his grip a fraction around Scott's waist. Then he froze with his hand splayed over Scott's chest, underneath his shirt. 

"Scott?" he asked. 

Scott grimaced. "Yep." 

"Scott, what's going on here?"

"Honestly? I was hoping you could tell me." 

Turned out Steve really, really couldn't.

After that, it was Steve that found his way to the blinds. It turned out there were no mantraps on the floor, and it definitely wasn't lava, but there actually were Legos - just a couple, scattered around - and there was something kinda weirdly nice about seeing an all-American hero curse and hop and rub his foot. HYDRA hadn't managed to stop him, but tiny plastic bricks on a bedroom floor maybe would. But he didn't have a whole lot of time to enjoy the moment; his eyes adjusted to the morning light and he looked around the room. 

Scott recognized some of the stuff on the shelves as his, like the photo of him and Cassie they took at the zoo on her seventh birthday and a couple of books he'd been saying he was going to read for about as long as she'd been alive. But then Steve's sneakers were underneath the desk and that old framed photo of the Howling Commandos absolutely wasn't Scott's, and Steve's watch was on the nightstand at his side of the bed and Scott bet if he wore a watch more than twice a year at best instead of checking the time on his cellphone like a teenager, it would've been on the nightstand at his side. They definitely had sides. Or someone wanted them to think they had, at least. Not that he was totally sure what kind of nefarious plan required Ant-Man and Captain America to think they had some kind of thing going on.

And when he looked at Steve, still frowning but maybe his mouth was kinda open like he had any clue what words might splurge out next, Steve looked right back at him with his own suave version of the same damn look. He was wearing really low-slung pajama pants and nothing else, barefoot and barechested, and Scott's gaze followed Steve's hand down to his abdomen. There was a long, faded scar there, shiny like a strand of fishing line strung right across his belly. Steve felt it with his fingers, looking down, then he looked back up at Scott. Under any other circumstances, Scott would've totally enjoyed the view, but he felt as unsettled as Steve looked.

"What the hell is going on here?" Steve asked, but he didn't sound like he thought Scott knew. Scott guessed he had to thank God for small mercies, at least. 

Scott sat up. He was wearing unfamiliar PJs that happened to be in exactly his size and he got out of bed and he checked his own belly: nothing, no scar. He glanced out of the window; they were at the Avengers compound but it wasn't the one Stark Industries had spent so remarkably little time rebuilding after the whole Thanos thing - he was pretty sure it was, somehow, the original. Then he glanced at the door; it didn't look locked, mostly because it was slightly ajar, so they probably weren't being held prisoner. It would've been a hell of a prison if they had, he guessed.

"We should look around," Scott said. Steve nodded and pulled on a shirt, which Scott kinda found himself regretting in spite of everything. And as they went for the door, Scott was the one who stood on a Lego, like the universe knew he'd perversely enjoyed seeing Steve do it. 

Vision wandered through a wall just down the hall, acknowledged them both and then knocked on Wanda's door. Tony was in his workshop; he completely ignored the two of them as they passed by, but Scott thought that seemed pretty in character for what he knew of the guy. Natasha was in the kitchen, drinking coffee and reading a newspaper with a date on it that made Scott frown even harder than usual. The girl playing on the huge rug with roads printed all over it right by the kitchen window looked a lot like Morgan Stark, just a few years older. And she was playing Legos with a younger girl, who looked kinda familiar but not. Then again, Scott got that a lot. Maybe. Maybe not like this.

"What's the last thing you remember?" Scott asked Steve as they stood there, quietly, trying not to stare at a should-be-dead newspaper-reading Natasha Romanoff. They were wearing rings on their fingers; Scott saw Steve playing with his behind his back so he knew he knew they were there. 

Steve frowned. "Coming back," he replied. "We took the stones back. We were in New York. The bald lady put the time stone into some kind of a medallion and we came back."

"So you remember getting back?"

For just an instant, Steve cringed. "No," he said. "I remember hitting the button, then waking up. In bed. With you." 

Scott smiled tightly. "I think we overshot the mark," he said. Then he walked over to the rug, and crouched, and the younger girl grinned up at him. She had Scott's eyes and Steve's mouth and long dark hair like Cassie's and he had no goddamn explanation but part of Scott just knew. Like somehow he'd known since the moment he'd woken that weird as this all was, there was nothing _dangerous_ about it. 

"What's your name, kid?" Scott asked, and the girl frowned up at him. 

"I'm Izzie, daddy, did you forget me?"

When Scott glanced up, Steve's brows were trying to make a break for his hairline. He still looked halfway like he wanted to make a break for the nearest exit and keep on running until he hit the Atlantic, but Scott looked back down. He ruffled Izzie's hair. She grinned, Legos still in hand. 

"Of course not, munchkin," he said, and he sat down cross-legged on the rug next to her and Morgan. "You know, I think I see someone who really needs a hug right now." He glanced conspiratorially - really obviously - across the room in Steve's direction, and Izzie promptly picked herself up and shot across the room just like a mini supersoldier. Scott guessed maybe she was. 

She launched herself Steve and apparently without thinking he swept her up off of her feet. She laughed. Steve smiled. 

"You forgot again," Morgan said. 

"Again?"

"My dad says it happens every couple of years." 

Scott smiled wryly. Turned out a nine-year-old knew more about what was going on than he did. He had no idea how he knew how old she was, but there it was. It wasn't even the weirdest thing that had happened to him in the last forty minutes.

There was a lot that he needed to work out. But when Steve looked at him across the room with Izzie in his arms, somehow he knew they'd work it out together.

\---

The first night, after a really weird day, they slept in separate rooms. Tony had had the place built like they might need space for two full teams someday so it wasn't like there wasn't a spare room Steve could crash in, even if something in Scott kinda felt regretful to see him go; he wasn't totally sure if that was just because hey, weird as it had been, waking up with Captain America had turned out pretty nice, or if some small part of him remembered. 

A couple of awkward days later, Morgan told her dad they'd forgotten again. Scott rolled his eyes and shook his head and smiled when he called her a tattle-tale, and she snorted and elbowed him in the hip. She kinda reminded him of Cassie, except he'd seen her homework on the table at breakfast - Tony could help her with her math himself. 

"So, I guess that explains why you both keep looking at me like I died saving the universe," he said, surprisingly cheerful about it. Apparently someone had told him that story before. Apparently this timeline had... a few pretty big differences. "Okay, look, I'll go ahead and put you out of your misery. You made a video last time." Scott's brows rose. Tony made a face. "Not that kind of video, Bug-Man, c'mon."

Then he had F.R.I.D.A.Y. hit play - who even knew the room had a projector - and made himself scarce. In the air like something out of Star Wars, versions of themselves appeared. They were sitting close together, really close, like Scott realized the two of them were. Video-Steve was playing with his wedding ring. Steve-Steve must've noticed because he stopped playing with his. Scott was frankly just kinda surprised he hadn't taken it off; he'd taken his own off the night before, promptly dropped it and watched in slow-motion horror as it rolled underneath the bed. Fortunately, the only other things under there were one odd sock, a three-inch stegosaurus and a Lego Captain America, complete with shield. He'd rubbed the band of pale skin around his finger and put the ring back on 'cause who knew, maybe next time he'd manage to punt the damn thing out the second floor window into a flowerbed or get it eaten by a passing flerken. 

The video explained some stuff (like how a guy had gotten pregnant in the first place: turned out the Xandarians had been doing that crap for decades). It didn't explain other stuff (like _why_). And when video-Scott said, "Look, we know this is gonna be really, _really_ weird," and then kinda half-smiled and leaned closer to the camera like he was leaning closer to Scott, and said, "I mean, okay, probably less weird for you and more weird for him..." Steve frowned. Scott saw. 

After, Steve took a breath. What he asked was, "Why would this be weirder for me than it is for you?"

Scott shrugged. "That was future me who's technically past me talking about stuff we don't remember 'cause it happened while we were...in transit? I think? And you really expect past future me to make sense right now?"

Steve sighed. He dropped his head into his hands and he scrubbed his hands through his hair and as Scott left him there, because it seemed kinda like he needed some space, Scott wondered if he knew he was lying. 

He called Cassie - she was at school and he caught her right in the middle of chem class but she picked up anyway and headed outside because it turned out they had an agreement where he'd only call on a day she was meant to be at college if there was some kind of an emergency. He told her he couldn't remember that; she told him that kinda constituted an emergency. And it was great to talk to her, even if she was pretty much old enough to drink and three second ago she'd been watching cartoons and playing soccer at her middle school, but the whole time he was still wondering if Steve knew if he was lying.

Spider-Man stopped by for dinner and spent the whole time making Scott feel really old with references to movies Scott remembered from high school that were made before he was born; the whole time, he was basically physically incapable of not glancing at Steve. Scott put Izzie to bed not too long after dinner and spent an hour on the phone to Hope; he looked up every time someone walked by, like maybe it would be Steve. Then he went to bed, in the room that had all of Steve's crap in it, still wondering. 

He guessed Steve probably knew he was lying. So, the next morning, while their daughter was playing dress-up with a surprisingly amenable foul-mouthed raccoon, Scott took Steve by the wrist and pulled him aside and went right ahead and blurted out, "Look okay, it's because past me was into you. Past me thought you were great. And hot. Like, _really_ hot." He smiled, maybe kinda self-deprecatingly. He held up one hand, complete with ring, and prodded at it with his thumb. "I guess it's easier on me because I don't have to wonder why I wanted this." He dropped his hand down and hovered it, fingers spread, a couple of inches away from where he knew the scar was on Steve's abdomen. "Or this." He stepped back. He ran his hands over his hair. He knocked his forehead just lightly against the nearest wall then turned and leaned back against it before finally, he glanced sideways at Steve again, hands jammed into the pockets of his jeans. 

"I was about half a second away from in love with you already," he said, and then he smiled, big and toothy but wry. "But look, it's okay. It's fine. I'm gonna shut the fuck up about this and we can move your stuff to the new room or, uh, if you hate the new room then I can move or, just, whatever you want. Just let me know. Or...ask someone else to let me know. Ask F.R.I.D.A.Y. to let me know. Okay?" He nodded. "Okay." Then he pushed off of the wall and walked away, kinda shaky and maybe he had a lump in his throat but he guessed at least he'd done the right thing. 

The next day, when he headed into the kitchen, Steve was sitting at the counter with two half-finished bowls of novelty cereal, drawing with Izzie. She was pretty good, which probably explained the drawings magnetised to the refrigerator. Scott just said a quick good morning, gave her a quick hug and a quick smile, grabbed a quick cup of coffee and then made himself scarce. 

That afternoon, he spent an hour with Izzie building something out of what he was pretty sure were three mixed-up Lego sets of Buckingham Palace, the Death Star and a pirate ship complete with Jolly Roger. He's still not totally sure where the dinosaurs came from, but one of them definitely ate Darth Vader. 

Then he and Steve and a semi-retired Tony (the only Avengers on hand, as it happened) spent half the night in Florida dealing with a bank heist gone wrong in the wake of a meteor shower. It turned out turning huge and yanking pieces of broken-down building and broken-up asteroid off of an ancient strip mall whose only occupants were three would-be bank robbers and a security guard with a really loud German shepherd was pretty tiring. Turned out turning even huger and holding up a falling-down apartment block while Captain American and Iron Man got everyone the hell out was even more tiring. He passed out in the jet on the way back to Avengers HQ. 

"Did everyone make it?" he asked, when he finally woke up. 

Steve nodded. He smiled faintly as he sat there next to him on the edge of the bed in the room that was theirs but kinda wasn't theirs. 

"Yeah," he said. He patted Scott's chest over the blanket, like _good job, Ant-Man_. He patted Scott's stubbly cheek (he figured it must've been a good 24 hours or so), like a little bit less _good job_ and little bit more something else. When he cupped Scott's jaw with one hand and rubbed his cheek with his thumb, Scott's stomach did something he told himself was coincidental hunger pangs but absolutely wasn't. Then Steve leaned over and kissed him, slowly, not exactly chastely, right on the mouth.

"But how about you let Tony hold up the building next time?" he said, when he pulled back. Then he raised his brows at him, really close to smiling, and got up and left the room. He sent Strange in to check on him. Two minutes after that, Scott was pretty sure he knew why the guy had been a surgeon: you'd have to be under anesthetic to want to be that jackass's patient. But his brain was still stuck tight to that kiss.

He slept most of the day and spent most of the rest of it eating. Izzie came in and held his hand and told him she'd seen him on the news and asked if one day she could turn big like him - he actually guessed she'd be better at it, given the whole half-supersoldier thing, but that was almost as scary as finding out Cassie had been training with Hope and Hank and Janet. Then he fell asleep again. 

When he woke up, Steve was sleeping next to him. Somehow that almost didn't feel weird.

\---

Right now, there are two things Scott knows with complete certainty: 

1) Thirteen nights ago, he'd been married once and he had one kid in the world; now, he's been married twice and he has two daughters. One of them inherited supersoldierness from her other dad. Turns out nobody had even known that could be passed on.

2) Time travel is a finicky-ass thing. It works however it damn well wants to at any given moment and Scott's quit trying to understand it. It was probably something they did but Scott likes to think of it like the time stone playing DeLorean.

The morning after, Scott raised his brows at Steve and Steve shrugged against the mattress. "What made you think the feeling wasn't mutual?" he said, by way of explanation, though it really didn't explain a whole lot. Scott found he was fine with that, though; the one advantage he's found to not being Tony Stark is knowing when you should and shouldn't question your own good fortune. 

Twelve days ago, he woke up with a husband and second daughter he's pretty sure weren't there before, having somehow changed the future by changing the past. He still doesn't know how they did that. He's pretty sure they'll never know. 

What he does know is two nights ago when Bruce and Tony told them, "We're pretty sure we know a way to send you back," he looked at Steve and Steve looked at him and they both said a resounding no. Tony and Bruce seemed pretty relieved - they were pretty sure their timeline would've kept on existing, but who the hell even knew anymore. 

What he does know is last night, Steve came to bed and locked the door behind him and stood on a Lego on his way across the room. He laughed and Scott grinned and when Steve made it to the bed, he straddled Scott's lap and kissed him as he sat there against the headboard. Scott wrapped his arms around Steve's waist and kissed him back. He'd say it'll take some getting used to, but he's pretty sure that in a way, it won't. He doesn't remember, but in a way he doesn't need to. 

Scott's not sure how they conceived but he's pretty sure it wasn't the old-fashioned way. It was something to do with medicine in the Nova Empire and something something science, the Xandarians owed someone a favor. Probably they couldn't adopt on Earth. Probably Steve did the whole medical marvel thing 'cause Izzie would've kicked her way right out of Scott, except who really knew? 

Scott knows two things for sure. And okay, so aside from that he knows he'll never be a world-class physicist, and he'll never be a world-class biologist. And he knows he'll never remember what he did or Steve did or they did together that got them here, to this. 

This morning, Steve's chest is pressed against his back and his arm's tucked in under his shirt and when he says _good morning_, it's muffled against the back of Scott's neck. It doesn't seem so strange anymore, but it never exactly felt wrong. 

Time and memory are fickle things and Scott guesses maybe they'll forget again. But they've got two years to figure that out, if the timeline holds. 

He pushes Steve onto his back and he straddles his hips. These days, they have lighter blinds; Scott can see the hairline scar across Steve's belly that he traces with his fingertips. He can see it when Steve smiles up at him. They probably didn't conceive the old-fashioned way but for the past few days that hasn't stopped them trying stuff out. 

Steve dumps him down onto his back and Scott laughs, wrapping his legs around Steve's waist. Steve kisses him. It's like it's been like this forever, but still somehow like it'll never not be new. 

And Scott thinks maybe, certainty's not all it's made out to be.


End file.
